To say that Fiyero was enraged when Glinda told him about the unfortunate event at the lake, was an understatement.

Glinda excused herself several times.

"You see, it's just that I had to say yes! Not only that he saved my life, but I didn't really have a date yet, you never actually asked me out!"

"Excuse me, when I think it is obvious that my girlfriend will go to a stupid ball with me!", Fiyero ranted, eyebrows scrunched into a displeased glare.

"But I really had no choice!", Glinda tried to justify herself.

"It's not exactly your fault, it's this Boq who took advantage of your state of helplessness and outright forced you to be his date!"

"I'm not very happy about this, either, believe me, but I fear there is nothing to be done."

"Fine, then I'll ask Elphaba to go to the ball with me."

There was a sudden silence in which Glinda looked at her boyfriend with disbelieving eyes.

"You will do what?!"

"I think it's only fair. You'll go with Boq, there's nothing to be done about this, apparently. So I'm dateless. I suppose Elphaba is, too. If I go with her, none of us go alone and we can all have a nice evening."

Glinda snorted.

"Nice is not something I associate with an evening spent with Boq. But well, go ask Elphaba, I don't care. It's not like it's going to be an official date anyways, is it?"

Fiyero thought about that for a second.

His initial response would have been 'Why not?', but the rational part of his brain told him that this wouldn't have been an answer an already distraught girlfriend would have wanted to hear.

"Of course not", he replied then, even though he was in fact wondering what a 'real' date with Elphaba would be like.

"So how is it, Thropp, are you going to the ball with me?"

Elphaba turned her head around slowly, as if she wasn't sure what she was expecting to see.

"Why would you want to go to the ball with me?! Aren't you going with Glinda? You didn't have a fight, did you?"

A miffed expression crossed Fiyero's face as he answered, "No, not exactly."

When Elphaba gave him a questioning look, he continued elaborating what had happened earlier that day.

"...so now she's going to the ball with Boq and I'm the third wheel."

"So you thought you'd use me as a cheap fill-in, since no one asked me out anyways?"

Fiyero lunged forward and casually took Elphaba's hand.

"Oh, oh, no, that's not at all what I wanted to imply with that!"

When he noticed that Elphaba had stiffened he let her hand drop as if he had burned himself.

An awkward silence developed, as it did so often between the two of them ever since the strange incident with the lion cub.

Elphaba cleared her throat.

"Well...what did you want to imply?"

Fiyero looked at her for what seemed like an eternity and Elphaba could feel her heart thump against the inside of her chest.

"What I so rudely expressed earlier was nothing other than an attempt to say that I would be more than delighted if you spent the evening of the Christmas Ball with me."

"I still don't believe that you're not just using me as the rebound girl because your girlfriend ditched you for a Munchkin."

"How can I convince you that I'm honestly interested in going out with you?"

There was something in the way he said this that made Elphaba start to take his plea more seriously.

But as soon as she let herself believe him, a sense of guilt came gnawing at her conscience.

After all, Glinda was her best friend and she couldn't betray her.

Still, it was Glinda who was going to the ball with another boy, so why shouldn't she go with Fiyero?

"Fine, I want you to answer one simple question. Completely honest, no sugarcoating or flatteries to get me to go out with you."

Fiyero nodded.

"Given that Glinda wasn't your girlfriend, would you have asked me to go to the ball with you? Don't just answer, think about it and tell me the truth, would you have asked me out?"

She looked at Fiyero sternly, hoping he wouldn't notice how shaky she had become.

He met her eyes with a serious expression, no smile or mischief underneath.

"Yes."

Nothing else but a simple 'yes'.

Baffled, Elphaba stared at him.

His answer had been sincere, she had felt it in her heart.

Once again she cleared her throat.

"I suppose we will attend the ball together then."